"What is it, and why do I need it?"

Home Automation is quickly becoming more of a necessity than a luxury, as home technology and the amount of "connected" or "smart" devices we use, increases exponentially. Every day, we read more about items that used to be simple household machines or appliances such as washing machines or air-conditioners, and how they are now able to be controlled by you, from outside your home, in order to make life just that little bit simpler and stress-free.

Where we once used to be over the moon to simply have our TV and DVD player controlled by one combined remote, we can now bring control of virtually any electronic device in your home, in to one, easy to use interface.

Making your home a "Smart Home" gives you the benefits of controlling not just your home entertainment system, but also things such as lighting, blinds, access control (gates, garagde doors etc.) climate control and even access to your solar energy management.

Whether it be at the time of design/build, or as an upgrade to bring your existing home "up to speed", incorporating home automation and smart technologies in to your home will not only make your life easier and give you more time to just "live" your life, but can also be an excellent draw-card should you decide to place your home on the market when you're ready to begin the next chapter of your life.

"How does it work?"

Each component in your home that can be integrated has one or more methods of being controlled. This may be via the traditional Infra-red remote control that was supplied with it at the time of purchase, or via other, more sophisticated methods which we can use when building your system.

All of these components are connected to a single (or on larger projects, multiple) controller. This controller is the heart of your system. It is the brain that converts our requests in to actions, to be performed by your Television/Music System/Lighting etc..

We tell this controller what to do via a user interface. This can be in the form of a dedicated touchscreen, an application installed on a smartphone or tablet, or by means of a conventional handset. Traditionally this was called a universal remote control, but we feel the term no-longer does it justice due to the fact that it holds so much more capability and potential than a regular remote control.

Once you press the button or icon to perform the task you want, the wheels quickly turn behind the scenes to tell the various components in your system what to do. So, instead of you performing half a dozen or more button presses while juggling several different controllers just to turn on your favourite TV show, we can combine that with other things like dimming your lights to a predetermined level, setting the temperature on your air-conditioner and locking the front door, all while you settle in to fall asleep in front of the TV,  by pressing one button, on one remote.

The possibilities are largely limited only by your imagination, and of course, your level of investment.

How much do I need to invest?

We are able to design systems to suit most budgets. The beauty of how we work and the style of equipment that we use is that you are able to start small and grow your system as you desire, or jump straight in and design a whole-house system with us to completely convert your entire living space over a matter of weeks.

In a lot of cases, we are able to supply the basic required equipment to begin your journey, for under $1000.